New study boosts local campaign for paid sick leave

People register Wednesday February 21, 2018 at the Mega Career Fair at the Norris Conference Center on Loop 410. San Antonio can boast a lower than average cost of living, but it’s also a city where workers get paid less, data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show.

Photo: John Davenport /San Antonio Express-News

The campaign to make mandatory paid sick leave a reality in San Antonio just got some statistical reinforcement.

The Institute for Women’s Policy Research (IWPR) has released a new study which finds that approximately 39 percent of San Antonio workers lack paid sick leave, a figure which puts San Antonio above the estimated national average of 36 percent.

The study also determined that San Antonio has about 354,000 workers without paid sick leave, compared to 302,000 for Dallas and 223,000 for Austin.

IWPR’s report determined that the percentages of San Antonians getting by without paid sick leave are particularly high for Latinos (43 percent) and those working in service occupations (62 percent).

These findings come only a few weeks after a coalition of advocacy groups called Working Texans for Paid Sick Time launched petition drives in both San Antonio and Dallas to get sick-leave initiatives on the ballot.

“It (the IWPR report) is absolutely confirmation of what we already know, just from knocking on doors and talking to voters every day,” said Michelle Tremillo, the executive director of the Texas Organizing Project, an organization that is helping to lead the coalition’s petition drives.

“It’s just further proof that it’s critical to have a policy ensuring that all working families in San Antonio have access to take care of themselves or a loved one when they’re sick,” Tremillo added.

Momentum has been building on this issue since the Austin City Council passed a paid-sick-leave ordinance in February, making Austin the first Texas city to mandate that businesses provide paid sick time to their employees.

The San Antonio petition drive launched in March, facing a high bar for success and carrying the ambitious goal of taking the initiative to voters in November.

The San Antonio City Charter states that an initiative petition must contain valid signatures from at least 10 percent of people eligible to vote in the most recent municipal election. Based on numbers from the Bexar County Elections Department, that would mean Working Texans need more than 75,000 signatures to get their initiative on the ballot.

Their cause has been complicated by the controversy over three charter-amendment petitions recently circulated by the firefighters union on a set of proposals meant to limit the power of the municipal government.

Working Texans are gathering signatures in a local climate of petition fatigue and confusion, but Tremillo said the firefighters’ effort hasn’t impeded the sick-leave petition drive at all.

“The petition drive is going very well,” she said. “We are absolutely on pace for where we wanted to be. People are happy to sign this petition. And they know exactly what they’re signing for.”

The paid-sick-leave movement also has generated a backlash from Gov. Greg Abbott and fellow Republicans such as Attorney General Ken Paxton and state Sen. Donna Campbell.

“These policies will be crushing, especially for small businesses,” Abbott said last month to Peggy Fikac, the Austin bureau chief for the San Antonio Express-News.

Social-justice activists counter that 40 entities across the country have adopted sick-leave policies without damaging their economies. They also argue that paid sick leave results in a healthier population and allows parents to better fulfill their caregiving duties to their children.

IWPR used a two-pronged approach in its study, crunching numbers from the 2014-16 National Health Interview Survey and running them through the results of the 2016 American Community Survey to arrive at the San Antonio totals, according to Jessica Milli, study director for the research organization.

Those IWPR numbers will only add weight to what could be an intense fall campaign from Working Texans.

Castro’s ‘Unlikely Journey’

Former Mayor Julián Castro’s long-awaited memoir looks to be close to publication. The book, which bears the tentative title of “An Unlikely Journey,” is currently in the editing stage and expected to hit stores in October.

The timing of the book rollout will be politically beneficial for Castro, who is likely to announce a 2020 presidential bid within a few weeks of that publication date.

Castro signed a book deal (including a $127,500 advance) with Little, Brown in November 2012, only two months after delivering a keynote address at the Democratic National Convention that memorably included a reference to his life’s “unlikely journey.” The book’s publication date was pushed back in 2014 after then-President Barack Obama appointed Castro to head the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Gilbert Garcia is a native of Brownsville, Texas, with more than 20 years experience writing for weekly and daily newspapers. A graduate of Harvard University, he has won awards for his reporting on music, sports, religion, and politics. He is the author of the 2012 book, "Reagan's Comeback: Four Weeks in Texas That Changed American Politics Forever," published by Trinity University Press. One of his feature stories also appeared in the national anthology, "Da Capo Best Music Writing 2001."